How often is lifting a particular muscle group too much?

Answer 1

In my reading of my fitness magazines, you should give at least 48 hours of rest between routines. So if you go to a gym, and do say, upper-body or chest or back exercises... you should not exercise that same body part for 48 hours.

If you are still sore after 48 hours, you should probably give yourself 72 hours.

As you progress in weight training, generally, your body adapts to training better.

I'd also recommend that you do not do more that 12 - 15 sets for any body part in one session (on a regular basis). This too can lead to overtraining.

Each individual is different and you'll have to gauge your progress. Some people thrive on intense training while others need rest.

So the short answer is that you have to go by feel rather than a hard, set rule, but do know that you'll likely fall in the median range (as described above).

Good luck.

Answer 2

We are all different and our muscles are all at different stages of fitness and development. If you've damaged a specific muscle group by over-training, your muscle will feel sore, weakened and take longer to heal than normal (maybe a week - so don't fret).

Over-training is usually done by those keen folks who are new to sport and just over-enthusiastic - they think that doing more for longer will produce better results WRONG!. It has the negative effect of making you ache and taking longer to heal which impacts upon your training schedule - you've gotta wait till the damaged muscle heals.

In future, limit yourself to say the required 10 reps, then move on to your next muscle group. As you improve in tone, you'll be able to do more circuits with gradually heavier weights.

Hope this helps

cornflake#1